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Protect the Singaporean Worker

“I was quite disappointed in the turnout today”, started Mr. Ravi Philemon. “But then I thought, perhaps the unemployed and the retrenched have got just enough money in their EZ Link card to go for the next interview”, he said, to a round of applause and laughter. “Although they are not here in person, they are surely with us in spirit.” He urged those that present to take heart in making their concerns and voices heard for the unemployed in this crisis.

Mr Philemon spoke at length on the need for unemployment insurance and drew rounds of applause from those present. He related a recent webchat session he had with the Manpower Minister, Mr. Gan Kim Yong. He told the minister that Unemployment Insurance should be a matter of rights for the workers and that workers should not be dependent on handouts in the form of allowances and aids. He said that Unemployment Insurance gives the retrenched and unemployed worker a sense of financial security, that it encourages domestic consumption which keeps the economy going at an acceptable level, and that it also gives financial institutions the added assurance to keep on lending even in the event of an economic crisis.

"Where were the Farid Khans and the Salleh Maricans? Why didn't they come?... Because they knew that in an open election - all things being equal - a non-Chinese candidate would have no chance."
Having contested an election as a minority candidate, I am disturbed enough by his comments to write this note. Let me explain why.

Simple answer for PM Lee

I declined invitations to contest the 2011 General Election. This was because I was at a different stage of my life. My children were much younger, I had just come back from the USA a few years before and had to re-establish my career here. I did not know if I had the temperament for public life. These were just some of the reasons why I chose to decline those invitations.

Even in 2011, the pool of people who could qualify for the Presidential race was small.…

The Ministry of Communication and Information (MCI) has taken out a Facebook ad titled, 'Get real about fake news', The ad is taken out after the PAP-controlled Parliament passed the Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulation (POFMA) Bill, with all opposition Members of Parliament voting against the Bill.

The ad draws attention to the viral hoax that Punggol Waterway Terraces had collapsed. The ad said "the hoax triggered anxiety amongst the residents", and urged Singaporeans to "say no to fake news".

It is unfortunate that a website published such an unverified report, and it is certainly unacceptable that it caused much anxiety to the residents of the development (and to all Singaporeans). The publishers and the editors of the website acted irresponsibly in posting the report of the 'collapse' without proper verification, and no one should make any excuses for them for this.

Lamenting the lack of concentration of brilliance in Singapore, PM Lee Hsien Loong in a IPS dialogue held recently said that he believed in having a certain natural aristocracy in the system (a form of elitism where people are respected because they have earned that) for without that society will lose out. (Transcript of Speech here: http://bit.ly/1JOtiYP)

His views are of course not new and he had articulated them in another Speech in the year 2007, expressing why he believed that Singapore does not have enough talent for two A-Teams (link: http://bit.ly/1NFyA9s).

I am not sure if this view is healthy for Singapore. Why I say that? Let me quote a few persons and articles before I make my point.